Encrypt messages using Snowden-endorsed “SIGNAL”

Encrypt messages using Snowden-endorsed “SIGNAL”

The most appreciable and trustworthy encryption app called SIGNAL, endorsed by none other than Snowden himself saying that he uses it every day, has introduced beta version of itself for tablet users. The app is available on Google chrome web store. Although encryption fans will have to wait before testing it; the waitlist currently numbers in the thousands.

There are number of encryption apps available in the market but Signal is the first one to achieve this milestone. Open whisper system, the company which has made Signal app possible, has said “Our objective is to make private messaging and end-to-end encryption ubiquitous. You can be having a conversation on your phone, and if you want to use all ten fingers, you switch to your desktop and the conversation is right there…That’s a requirement of the modern world, but we haven’t historically had end-to-end encryption that allowed people to use their devices that way.”

Currently the app can only sync between an android phone and desktop. Also no voice encryption is available right now. The company has promised that they are working on bringing this app on other platforms like IOS soon, along with encrypted desktop voice calls and more encrypted file-sharing features. The apps popular predecessors named Redphone and TextSecure have been integrated into the same. Open Whisper Systems itself can’t see the plain text of messages or get access to phone calls since it doesn’t store the encryption keys.

Unlike many apps in this field, Signal is free and open source, meaning that the source can be examined for backdoors and this enables interested parties to examine the code and help the developers verify that everything is behaving as expected. There has been growing concern that software vendors may have been pressured into adding capabilities in their products that would assist government surveillance programs. In theory, having open-source code means such tampering could be identified.

Launching on the desktop may be the next step in Signal’s encryption domination, seamlessly replacing tools like Skype and Google Hangout with something far more secure. “Our objective is to produce products that are completely frictionless and where the security aspect is as invisible as possible,” Marlinspike says. “It works just like any insecure messaging app that you’re used to.”